May 2008

Make Your Own Conspiracy Theory

I don’t believe conspiracy theories, but I enjoy thinking them up. For example, I always wondered why there was no conspiracy theory blaming Rudy Giuliani for planning 9/11 as a way to become president. I’m sure he didn’t, but if you were writing the movie, that would be the twist ending. In fact, the TV series Heroes had a similar plot. No one had more to gain from 9/11 than Giuliani did, including Osama Bin Laden. It all makes perfect sense, in a nutjob conspiracy theory way.

Recently I saw some stories on the Internet about three undersea Internet cables being “accidentally” cut within a brief period. Lots of countries were affected, but the most interesting impact is Iran’s Internet traffic (allegedly) dropping to zero.

In my book, The Religion War (sequel to God’s Debris), shutting down the Internet was the first step before the Christian Alliance attacked the Muslim Caliphate. The idea was to shut down all outbound communication from the war zone so the Christian armies could attack in ways that their own citizens wouldn’t support if they knew about it.

It seems highly coincidental that three undersea cables get cut and the only country entirely shut off is Iran. I doubt it is the first step before war, but you can’t help raising an eyebrow when reality starts to intersect with fiction.

My other favorite conspiracy theory involves AIPAC picking the next president of the United States. Again, I don’t think this is happening in reality, but if you were going to write a fictional story of this election involving a conspiracy, the plot would involve an inexplicable come-from-behind “surge” of the candidate that is most hawkish on Iraq. And that is what has happened with John McCain. His candidacy had been given up for dead, but largely because of his position on the surge in Iraq, he has become one of the frontrunners.

And why is public opinion on Iraq starting to move toward McCain’s position? Public opinion is controlled by the media. And who do the conspiracy theorists think controls the media? Answer: AIPAC.

Just to be clear, I don’t believe any of these conspiracy theories, especially the ones I make up myself. But if McCain becomes the republican nominee, and Rudy Giuliani becomes his running mate, and the Republicans score an unexpected victory over the Democrats, someone needs to turn it into a movie.

Comments

Ahh, yes, conspiracy theories, we tried to make one up many years ago on Crunchland BBS. Strangely, I can only remember my own idea: "The are trying to destroy the US economy by reprogramming the traffic lights to stay red for longer"

You don't believe 19 hijackers conspired to crash airplanes into the World Trade Center and Pentagon? You don't believe Nixon and CREEP conspired to break into Democratic National Headquarters? You believe there really was an attack on U.S. ships in the Gulf of Tonkin, as reported? You really believe that the real motivation behind any government policy corresponds to the official, publicly stated rationale?

EVERYBODY believes in "conspiracy theories." The very term "conspiracy" is a substitute for rational thought.

I popped one out the other day without even trying:
The reason Clinton won the CA primary when so many dems I talked to planned to vote Obama is that independents couldn't vote in the repub primary, so all the right-leaning independents voted for Clinton so she'd get the nomination and mobilize the repub base come November.
Sometimes it's too easy.

The first cables were cut by Israel to punish Egypt. The Palestinians had broken through into Egypt, and the Egyptians let them stay and buy things. To force Egypt to reclose the border, they cut the cable which disrupted Egyptian internet traffic and affected business.http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,2254669,00.asp

The Egyptians have now reclosed the border with Gaza, and have publicly in the paper said they would break the legs of any Palestinian caught going into Egypt

Once Israel showed how easy it was to cut the cable and get away with it, the USA probably moved on the other cables to isolate Iran, as the other writers have noted.
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AIPAC will choose the next president. Support for Iraq is the reason McCain is winning the republican nomination. The man is 70 some years old and has cancer. There is no way a sane country or party would choose someone like that as a candidate. The chances he will die or get cancer again, must be astronomical.

On the democratic side Hillary Clinton is most pro Israel, so she is most likely to be chosen by AIPAC. It is not a certainty yet though because as the campaign goes on, Obama seems to be making more and more pro Israel statements. If he makes enough, maybe AIPAC and Israel will ditch Hillary and go with Obama.

If AIPAC does go with Hillary, look for the AIPAC controlled states of New York, Florida, and California to all go Hillary. Also, there is a large group of small states that AIPAC has taken over the governorships and Senate and Representative seats. Combine those small states with New York, Florida, and California and Hillary wins.

Scott,
Since you (and I) believe that the war in Iraq was a mistake and don't believe conspiracy theories, let me pose these two opposing ideas, or theories, to you:

a) George Bush and his administration truly believed that going to war with Iraq was necessary in the war on terrorism, and still is, because of all of the reasons they gave to the public before going to war.

b) George Bush and his administration waged a campaign of misinformation and/or lies to rally public support for the war, while keeping their true motives for the war secret because they would not have garnered enough public support to start the war.

All of the current facts seem to point to b) as the truth, but b) definitely has the mark of a conspiracy theory. Do you believe b) is true?

P.S. I'm more interested in hearing your answer to my question than having it posted to the blog as a comment, but I'll take either.

Kennedy slept with Marilyn Monroe, who was married to Joe Dimaggio, Center fielder for the New York Yankees.

Dimaggio's name ends in a vowel, and we all know what that means.

Dimaggio was a close personal friend to Francis Albert Sinatra, even accompanying him on the famous "wrong door" raid. Sinatra's last name ends in a vowel, and we all know what that means.

Yankees held spring training every year in Cuba, until Cuba was taken over by Castro. Castro was a promising young pitcher. He once tried out for the Washington Senators. That's Washington DC, home of the Whitehouse and where Kennedy lived. The Senators told him his fast ball was too slow and his curve ball didn't curve. So he took over Cuba and the Yankees lost their spring training camp. Frank's friends lost their casinoes in Havana. Remember, Frank's friends are the successor's to the guys who rigged the 1919 world series.

Castro's name ends in a vowel, but nobody knows what that means.

The Washington Senators played their last season in Washington in 1963. After the death of Kennedy, the team name changed to the Rangers and the team relocated to Dallas, where the assasination took place.

MLB has never officially denied involvement in the assasination.

Oswald, who spent years in the Soviet Union, was undoubtedly a fan of the Reds.

The cable cuts are targeting the Iranian banking traffic and the Iranian island of Kishi where the oil bourse is supposed to go online 1-11.Feb, but now delayed (due to cable cuts) until 19.Feb. France and Russia are sending their fleets to Hormuz for "practice."

To the final outcome of these events it is not in our knowing, other than one Russian Banking Official, wishing to remain anonymous, stating that, “Should the Saudi’s effectively decouple their oil from the US Dollar, the United States, for all practical purposes will cease to be a World power as it economy will collapse completely as the US Dollar has no value in and of itself due to the staggering debt of the Americans. Without oil they are nothing."

Why is the first scenario you think of the one where the U.S. is covering something up? Let's start with the assumption that this was deliberate. There's an alternative explanation: this was a response to provocation.

"Damage to undersea Internet cables in the Mediterranean that hit business across the Middle East and South Asia was not caused by ships, Egypt’s communications ministry said on Sunday, ruling out earlier reports.

The transport ministry added that footage recorded by onshore video cameras of the location of the cables showed no maritime traffic in the area when the cables were damaged.

‘The ministry’s maritime transport committee reviewed footage covering the period of 12 hours before and 12 hours after the cables were cut and no ships sailed the area,’ a statement said.

‘The area is also marked on maps as a no-go zone and it is therefore ruled out that the damage to the cables was caused by ships,’ the statement added."

Actually Osama is an extraterrestrial who crash landed near Roswell in the 1940s, was on the grassy knoll two decades later, helped fake the moon landing, and is currently selling steroids to MLB players and Tour de France riders.

So NOW Iran has lost net connectivity. After two more cables were accidentally severed. I think either we're moving steadily out of coincidence territory here, or someone is about to be fired. Like, from a cannon.

Nate, perhaps when you are calling people ignorant, you should realize just how the blog comments work.

The name of the author comes BELOW their comment, not above.

It was amenot that wrote that, not me.
And he does have a point there to a certain extent: there are still a number of folks out there that will not vote for a woman or a Black man. They are ignorant folks, to be sure, but they prefer to be called Conservative Christians.